What are the advantages of using Linux over BSD? reddit / BSD ---------------------------------------------------------------------- oakstave · 2022-05-13 16:27 I think the speed of applications is faster in Linux, especially launching applications. Gaming is far superior. Nothing like Steam running Proton exists in the BSD world to the best of my knowledge. The reason I choose BSD's over Linux is because I am the system administrator on my machines. Linux is a hodgepodge, while the BSD's seem better engineered and consistent. Linux for desktops, BSD's for workstations. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- LiamW · 2022-05-13 16:43 Proton is ported and maintained on FreeBSD, fyi. I found FreeBSD 13 to be snappier/faster than Manjaro last year as a desktop (identical XFCE configurations). Have to do Manjaro for gaming however. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- oakstave · 2022-05-13 16:50 Oh cool!!! That's great. It's an amazing bit of software. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- motific · 2022-05-13 18:15 The advantage for me is that Linux occupies the YouNoobs that want to just chimp solutions without having a clue what they’re doing. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- hands0m3dude · 2022-05-13 18:42 Well that hurts :D. (I use arch BTW) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- JuanSmittjr · 2022-05-13 19:31 A mainstream linux (Ubuntu, Mint, Fedora, Opensuse, etc) is better regarding * hw support * security * ease of use (for FreeBSD you better rebuild the whole OS for yourself) * also zfs is working Although FreeBSD is fun. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- meefybeetwitch · 2022-05-13 19:34 What? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- hands0m3dude · 2022-05-13 19:35 Thanks for the answer. But actually some Linux people say that BSD has an advantage in security over Linux. Would you tell me your reason why do you think a mainstream Linux is more secure than a BSD? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- vermaden · 2022-05-13 19:59 Here: - https://vermaden.wordpress.com/2020/09/07/quare-freebsd/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- rdcldrmr · 2022-05-13 20:02 cc /u/JuanSmittjr > Would you tell me your reason why do you think a mainstream Linux is more secure than a BSD? Linux offers some modern mitigations in both the kernel and the toolchain, but they're often turned off (or not compiled in) by default. FreeBSD offers a minimal set of mitigations but almost all of them are turned off by default. They only enabled ASLR, a ~20 year old security feature, in the last year for example. There's a big difference between FreeBSD / NetBSD / Dragonfly and OpenBSD in this area. OpenBSD is quite far ahead of all of them, and Linux, in the area of security. That's their specialty. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- JuanSmittjr · 2022-05-13 20:12 I think it's a common myth that BSDs are more "secure" (also the definition of "security" is not easy). But I haven't seen any independent paper (recent or not) about a comparative security audit of linux and *BSD kernels (for example vanilla linux vs freebsd vs openbsd). But it's a fact that millions of devices are running linux (the kernel) and are 'audited' by millions of users, hackers, agencies and researchers every day without finding fundamentally critical flaws. The same can't be told about BSDs. BSDs are a relatively small niche which probably doesn't worth to attack because of the same effort against linux devices brings way better results. The number of active developers behind linux is I think bigger by orders of magnitude than behind *BSDs (also FreeBSD and openbsd doesn't share a common 'bsd kernel', so the *BSD resources are even more fragmented). This is about the kernels. But there are more aspects, like the whole concept of the OS, how it manages the services, how it applies industrial security standards, how the programs/packages are added to the repos (ports), how much work is it to keep them up to date. How easy is to update/patch the system, etc. etc. A lot of things should be also taken in account. I'm not against BSDs at all (I also have 1-2 severs running FreeBSD, also in the wild), but I think they are a bit overrated, because from my point of viewr *BSDs are niche/hobby/research OSes which can be used for real tasks if needed. (A bit like ReactOS or Haiku.) However I suggest you to try at least FreeBSD (or GhostBSD) because it is very interesting. It allows an insight into an era a couple of decades back, when computers were big and heavy ("it's not a server if two men can lift it" as one of my colleagues always said) and IT people were more serious. :) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- JuanSmittjr · 2022-05-13 20:18 > There's a big difference between FreeBSD / NetBSD / Dragonfly and OpenBSD in this area. OpenBSD is quite far ahead of all of them, and Linux, in the area of security. That's their specialty. Any papers about this? I mean the superiority of openbsd? For FreeBSD there is at least HardenedBSD which mostly enables the disabled features (AFAIK). If any of the bsd kernels were so better than the linux kernel, the world was run by WhateverBSD. Even the bsd licencing is better (for companies). ---------------------------------------------------------------------- JuanSmittjr · 2022-05-13 20:28 Citing vermaden about BSDs is like citing Linus (typo fixed) about linux. Interestng, but a bit biased ;) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- vermaden · 2022-05-13 20:32 Sorry - I misread the thread title - my mind read it (assuming we are on **BSD** subreddit) as **advantages of using BSD over Linux** ... Now back to REAL title I think these are advantages of Linux over BSD: - support for more WiFi cards (and with better speed) - more win32/win64 stuff works better on WINE - better Bluetooth support - Linux has *VirtualBox Extension Pack* available - Netflix/Spotify/... (DRM) support - probably a lot more that I did not thought about Regards. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- rdcldrmr · 2022-05-13 21:06 cc /u/hands0m3dude > Any papers about this? I mean the superiority of openbsd? https://www.openbsd.org/events.html https://www.openbsd.org/innovations.html https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRg2vuwF1hY (direct comparison) > If any of the bsd kernels were so better than the linux kernel, the world was run by WhateverBSD. Even the bsd licencing is better (for companies). If we're talking about security, that's not even remotely close to the truth. The vast majority of companies (and even everyday users) do not prioritize security, **especially** when it comes at the cost of backwards compatibility or some other performance / feature limitations. OpenBSD's strict stance on security is a big part of *why* it's not used more. It's not for everyone or every use case. Companies want support and someone they can blame when things break. They get that with Windows and Linux, not OpenBSD. Everyday users want ease-of-use and don't care about the technical underpinnings of whatever they're using. That's why phones and tablets (which use OpenBSD code, btw) are so much more popular than computers now. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- greatwhisper · 2022-05-14 04:28 Docker. I was a long time FreeBSD holdover. I love the build system, put up with slow hardware support, because the things that worked ALWAYS WORKED. Then came Docker, and I really liked it, and there's essentially no BSD support for it. Been Arch Linux since then. (Arch is the Linux distro that most closely resembles FreeBSD in my opinion) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- flexibeast · 2022-05-14 05:46 > But I haven't seen any independent paper (recent or not) about a comparative security audit of linux and *BSD kernels (for example vanilla linux vs freebsd vs openbsd). * https://www.cvedetails.com/vendor/33/Linux.html * https://www.cvedetails.com/vendor/6/Freebsd.html * https://www.cvedetails.com/vendor/97/Openbsd.html More generally: * https://www.cvedetails.com/top-50-products.php ---------------------------------------------------------------------- JuanSmittjr · 2022-05-14 06:01 Nice video and OFC I know some of the openbsd innovations but I was talking about independent sources not only comparing BSD kernels but BSD vs linux (and vs windows maybe). I think without this, one just can't say any of those is surely better than the others. > OpenBSD's strict stance on security is a big part of why it's not used more. I don't think so. If it was so much better, it would be used by companies because they don't have to spend money because the work is already done, etc. > It's not for everyone or every use case. That's why it's a niche and that's why it doesn't worth to put in a lot of effort to try to hack. I feel some kind of elitism behind BSDs (especially behind openbsd). But probably that's only me. > Everyday users want ease-of-use and don't care about the technical underpinnings of whatever they're using. I don't really see any contradiction here. A system can be fun and productive and easy to use while it's also secure. And here comes the question of the definition of "security". As soon as you start install programs (not only net facing services but an office suite, media player, games, etc. etc.) you become more and more exposed to threats. And probably from a point, you are not more secure on a BSD than on a Linux. Because noone will try to break the kernel directly when there are beautiful services waiting to be hacked. :) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- CleetusTheDragon · 2022-05-14 14:34 Application speed could go either way depending on the app ---------------------------------------------------------------------- oakstave · 2022-05-14 14:37 That tracks. I've certainly noticed that browsers, Firefox and Chromium, seem to take longer. But I haven't done those speed checks in about a year. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- sehnsuchtbsd · 2022-05-16 06:37 > OpenBSD is quite far ahead of all of them, and Linux, in the area of security Aside from pledge/unveil and KARL, how is OpenBSD far ahead of NetBSD regarding security (serious question)? As far as I can tell, on Net there are few useful things like Veriexec, PaX SEGVGUARD, blacklistd, KLEAK, security curtain, patched binary packages, which do not have a direct equivalent on OpenBSD. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- sehnsuchtbsd · 2022-05-16 07:29 Better hardware support, especially concerning wifi, bluetooth, touchpads (also, more primitive input drivers on BSD), touchscreens, webcams, suspending/resuming and multimedia/function keys, outside of Thinkpads and few other high-end product lines. You'll also have a hard time with dedicated soudcards, printers and scanners. This is only taking into account the desktop side of things. Graphics support varies and strictly depend on how much recent is the graphic stack which your BSD of choice is currently implementing (ported from Linux, but not necessarily in sync with latest kernel). NetBSD graphics usually lag behind the most, but the project is the sole BSD to ship with a opensource driver for NVdidia (nouveau). No NVidia support on OpenBSD. Linux has better performance than NetBSD and OpenBSD. FreeBSD's performance is comparable to Linux. NetBSD's performance is noticeably inferior. OpenBSD's even more/so (considerably inferior). Many opensource developer only officially support Linux and sometimes will refuse PRs to support other projects, which forces BSD maintainers to adopt downstream patches. Even those projects open to *BSD will not seldom accidentally break portability across releases, by introducism new Linuxism and deprecating cross-platform libraries. Clearly, no support for AppImage, Flatpak and alikes. As for propietary software support, it's practically nonexistent. If you need anything in partcular for study/work, you're out of luck, unless you use wine and virtual machines (many do so). ---------------------------------------------------------------------- sehnsuchtbsd · 2022-05-16 07:49 > * also zfs is working How is ZFS not working well on*BSD? FreeBSD traditionally has outstanding ZFS support and the filesystem is tightly integrated with the OS, the installer, the bootloader and the userland utils. As for NetBSD, I find its ZFS support to be at least as reliable as Linux' (no DKMS nightmare for one) even though its OpenZFS illumos branch lacks features which are available on ZoL. > * security Under which circumstances, for what reasons and according to whom is security kept in higher regard on Linux than each of the BSDs? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- JuanSmittjr · 2022-05-16 08:01 > Under which circumstances, for what reasons and according to whom is security kept in higher regard on Linux than each of the BSDs? Pls check my other comments. Thanks. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- sehnsuchtbsd · 2022-05-16 08:23 I see; those who know me will probably remember I've made similar observations (to yours) elsewhere in the past. Comparing BSDs to niche experimental/hobbyist projects like Haiku/ReactOS feels like stretch to me though. I mean, each of them is used somewhere in production and large portion of code have been used or are being used in commercial products and research. The infrastructure and release cycle is organized in a professional fashion and imho solid enough to ensure a good degree of reliability, with regard to security practices, revisions, auditing and prompt patching. Manpower is indeed orders of magnitude inferior (especially on NetBSD) but I think the few eyes looking over the code are at least 'good eyes'. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- rdcldrmr · 2022-05-16 14:32 I can give you some general answers, but what does "patched binary packages" mean in this context? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- sehnsuchtbsd · 2022-05-16 14:47 > but what does "patched binary packages" mean in this context? That you won't have to rebuild from source a given package whenever a bug in some third-party software is found; I was told this was a minor downside on OpenBSD which some users aren't particularly happy with. Nvm, I probably misread some comment made by users in the past: looking at the OpenBSD FAQ I can see this is not the case. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- cerka · 2022-05-16 18:59 This is not a good answer because it is missing the facts that 1. Linux is developed and used by more people than the BSDs and thus vulnerabilities are more likely to be found in it, even if the true rate of vulnerabilities per lines of code is the same, and 2. the Linux codebase is bigger because it has a larger feature set, so the absolute number of vulnerabilities found in it will be higher than for the BSDs, even if they have the same true vulnerability rate and rate at which vulnerabilities are discovered. A better approach to generate comparative evidence would be to apply the same static analysis tools to each codebase, or fuzz comparable subsystems in their codebases. Perhaps there are other viable approaches too? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- flexibeast · 2022-05-17 01:28 Both fair points. Interestingly, my experience has been that 1 has been used for many years to claim Windows isn't really less secure than other systems. i haven't seen 2 used in that way though. i might have a look around for any papers that take the sort of approaches you mention. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- cerka · 2022-05-17 05:19 I would be interested to read papers that do this too. Here's a very crude metric: Coverity Scan for [Linux](https://scan.coverity.com/projects/linux), [FreeBSD](https://scan.coverity.com/projects/freebsd), and [NetBSD](https://scan.coverity.com/projects/netbsd) ([amd64 kernel only](https://scan.coverity.com/projects/netbsd-amd64-kernel)). I don't know how seriously we should take the defect density it reports. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- flexibeast · 2022-05-17 05:24 Oh neat, thanks for sharing!